★★★★★
Legacy As I listen to Earth, Wind & Fire's 21st studio release, Now, Then & Forever, I'm reminded of Bonnaroo twitter followers posting their Wish Lists for the 2014 edition. With the festival regularly honoring the music world's past stars such as James Brown, Al Green, Loretta Lynn, Kenny Rogers and ZZ Top, it would be a thrill to hear EWF down on the farm turning on several generations of listeners...
- www.jambands.com
2014-02-03
★★★★★
The legacy of Earth, Wind & Fire may, for a wider audience, rest on the impossibly catchy disco hits and lush ballads of the late 70s and early 80s, but this spectacular box of goodies tells a richer story of endless invention and curiosity. Passing over their first two albums for Warner Bros, the band's lengthy tenure at Columbia begins with 1972's Last Days And Times, combining Motown-like pop sensibilities, driving funk and soul-infused folk (an inspired reworking of Where Have All The...
- recordcollectormag.com
2013-12-06
★★★★★
Photo: It is certainly safe to say Earth, Wind and Fire are pioneers in the world of music. With a forty-five-year career and a host of hits records making them one of America's best selling artists, they have made a return at just the right time with their first album in eight years.
The American Funk band from Chicago, Illinois mark their 'comeback' with 10 new tracks to show the new wave of artists reviving disco music that the original masters of soul-funk-fusion are very much still a...
- www.gigwise.com
2013-10-25
★★★★★
Now, Then & Forever Influencing the likes of Prince, Beyonce, Usher and even Robin Thicke - it is interesting to hear how Earth Wind & Fire look to progress their sound for 2013. Ultimately though there is no great transformation from their classic years - with the likes of Got To Be Love and Love Is Law taking you straight back to that golden era. The vocals are smooth and the production spotless, with Guiding Lights floating beautifully along on a sensual groove...
- www.music-news.com
2013-10-21
★★★★★
It would be easy for Earth, Wind & Fire, one of the best funk groups of all time, to rest on their laurels: tour occasionally for some extra dough, play the classics to get the old folks dancing, record albums that chop up those same classics and spit them back out again. (If you listen, for example, to the Temptations' "Stay", from 1998, you may notice a certain melodic similarity to "My Girl".) But Now, Then & Forever, the band's first album since 2005's Illumination, resists this temptation...
- www.popmatters.com
2013-09-23
★★★★★
Advances in technology in the80s sounded the death-knellof so many great groups; theEarth, Wind And Fire of1985's Electric Universe wassimilar to the Chic heard on 1983's Believer. Themachines may have reducedstudio costs, but the music,usually given space tobreathe with organicinstrumentation, was allbut stifled.
- recordcollectormag.com
2013-09-12
★★★★★
No matter what gender, genre or generation one aligns themselves with, you would be hard-pressed to find a music lover who remains unmoved by Earth, Wind & Fire. For nearly half a century, this self-contained band has enthralled audiences around the world with sophisticated arrangements heavily steeped in jazz, funk, soul, gospel and even African influences that turned messages of love, unity, self-awareness and spirituality into timeless hits ("September," "After The Love Is Gone," "Devotion,"...
- www.soultracks.com
2013-09-02
★★★★★
Note: Tracks in bold are compiled on The Essential Earth, Wind, and Fire More than any group during the 1970s, Earth, Wind, and Fire negotiated the traditions of heady, socially relevant soul music--like that of Marvin Gaye, Curtis Mayfield, Julian "Cannonball" Adderley, and Roberta Flack--with songs that possessed significant commercial appeal that could, in fact, make socially relevant soul music universal...
- www.popmatters.com
2011-01-20
★★★★★
Earth, Wind and Fire had logged four albums when they went in the studio in 1975 to record That's the Way of the World. The recording was to serve as the soundtrack to a long forgotten film of the same title...
- www.popmatters.com
2011-01-20
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